Bernar Venet (b. 1941)

Biography

1958 – Studies for one year at the Villa Thiole, the Municipal Art School of the City of Nice

Bernar Venet is known internationally for his large-scale steel sculptures. French born, Venet has based himself between Europe and New York City since 1967. Exhibiting since 1968, his works have been shown in major museums across Europe, the USA and Asia. Public sculptures have been commissioned and installed in equally as many varied locations including Cologne, Japan, Norway, Luxembourg, New York and Chicago, among others.

When Venet first went to New York at the age of 24 he encountered the works of Minimalist sculptors such as Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, Carl Andrew and Sol LeWitt, and was immediately drawn to their work through citing similarities to ideas he was already exploring in his own work. This spurred Venet’s art practice for many years – producing paintings, installations, drawings and wall mural pieces in steel, wood and coal. Today, Venet’s most recognised bodies of works are his steel Indeterminate Lines and Arcs. These sculptures are grounded in a Minimalist aesthetic, but also stem from his academic investigations into science and mathematics.

Bernar Venet seems to be the most intellectual of conceptual artists, but his intellectuality is a means to a romantic end – what Kant called “the feeling of the sublime.” Venet has had a life-long affair with mathematics, but the mathematical murals – his descriptive term – that are its grand climax, are more sublime than mathematical, or rather use mathematics as a springboard to the sublime. They are in fact an inspired rendering of what Kant called “the mathematically sublime.” (Donald Kuspit, Art: A Matter of Context, Writings 1975 – 2003: Bernar Venet, Hard Press Editions, 2004)

Venet’s sculptures are an exploration of material, form, balance and spatial perception. Monumentally sized, they hold viewers in awe of our insignificance in relation to these pieces of cold hard steel. However these works are not immune to being affected by their surroundings. These works change in appearance and perception each time they are installed in a new place, relating to their surrounding architecture and landscape. The power of this change is evident when viewing these works in such situations such as on the lawn in front of the Eiffel Tower, or in the middle of Park Avenue, New York.

Each Arc sculpture is engraved with its corresponding angle degree from which it derives, for example Arc 225. This locates the work within its rational and mathematics beginnings, and provides some reassurance when viewing these precariously balanced objects. On the other hand, the Indeterminate Lines seem to ask to be put back together into some picture or other. They represent the state of indeterminacy as an aspect of everything that has to do with flux. As Aristotle put it, “Nothing is true of what is changing – so anything in the process of flux is indeterminate. It’s as if the Arcs and Angles had started out as Indeterminate Lines; then, as the ontogenetic process advanced, they hardened or rigidified (at least for now) into a determinate state.” (Thomas McEvilley, Bernar Venet, Artha Benteli, 2002, p.35)

Venet’s primary studio is in New York; however his works are brought to realisation and produced at a foundry in Hungary. As is the nature of the material – steel is only malleable when heated to extremely high temperatures. The Arc series are produced by rolling the steel with machinery while the metal is hot, however the Indeterminate Lines require a more “hands-on” approach. Industrial clamps and tongs are used to hold the steel lengths while they are pulled and twisted into shape. “My work at the factory is a game of natural constraints between my intentions and the material itself. Each orients the other and is orientated in its turn. I propose directions but am at the same time directed by the steel bar which resists, and will not surrender to my will to dominate. In this game of concessions I must leave its autonomy at the helm.” (Bernar Venet, Bernar Venet, Artha Benteli, 2002, p.95)

Venet’s sculptures continue to tour Europe and North America, with recent exhibitions in Ceryg-Pontoise, France, Knookke-Heist, Belgium, downtown Chicago and at Gow Langsford Gallery, Auckland in early 2006. In 2004 Venet held three simultaneous solo exhibitions across New York City – at the Robert Miller Gallery, Jim Kempner Fine Art in Chelsea, and three large-scale Indeterminate Line pieces on the Park Avenue Malls.

In early 2005 Venet was awarded France’s highest decoration, Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur, for his enhancement to the reputation of France through arts.

1958 – Studies for one year at the Villa Thiole, the Municipal Art School of the City of Nice

Bernar Venet is known internationally for his large-scale steel sculptures. French born, Venet has based himself between Europe and New York City since 1967. Exhibiting since 1968, his works have been shown in major museums across Europe, the USA and Asia. Public sculptures have been commissioned and installed in equally as many varied locations including Cologne, Japan, Norway, Luxembourg, New York and Chicago, among others.

When Venet first went to New York at the age of 24 he encountered the works of Minimalist sculptors such as Donald Judd, Dan Flavin, Carl Andrew and Sol LeWitt, and was immediately drawn to their work through citing similarities to ideas he was already exploring in his own work. This spurred Venet’s art practice for many years – producing paintings, installations, drawings and wall mural pieces in steel, wood and coal. Today, Venet’s most recognised bodies of works are his steel Indeterminate Lines and Arcs. These sculptures are grounded in a Minimalist aesthetic, but also stem from his academic investigations into science and mathematics.

Bernar Venet seems to be the most intellectual of conceptual artists, but his intellectuality is a means to a romantic end – what Kant called “the feeling of the sublime.” Venet has had a life-long affair with mathematics, but the mathematical murals – his descriptive term – that are its grand climax, are more sublime than mathematical, or rather use mathematics as a springboard to the sublime. They are in fact an inspired rendering of what Kant called “the mathematically sublime.” (Donald Kuspit, Art: A Matter of Context, Writings 1975 – 2003: Bernar Venet, Hard Press Editions, 2004)

Venet’s sculptures are an exploration of material, form, balance and spatial perception. Monumentally sized, they hold viewers in awe of our insignificance in relation to these pieces of cold hard steel. However these works are not immune to being affected by their surroundings. These works change in appearance and perception each time they are installed in a new place, relating to their surrounding architecture and landscape. The power of this change is evident when viewing these works in such situations such as on the lawn in front of the Eiffel Tower, or in the middle of Park Avenue, New York.

Each Arc sculpture is engraved with its corresponding angle degree from which it derives, for example Arc 225. This locates the work within its rational and mathematics beginnings, and provides some reassurance when viewing these precariously balanced objects. On the other hand, the Indeterminate Lines seem to ask to be put back together into some picture or other. They represent the state of indeterminacy as an aspect of everything that has to do with flux. As Aristotle put it, “Nothing is true of what is changing – so anything in the process of flux is indeterminate. It’s as if the Arcs and Angles had started out as Indeterminate Lines; then, as the ontogenetic process advanced, they hardened or rigidified (at least for now) into a determinate state.” (Thomas McEvilley, Bernar Venet, Artha Benteli, 2002, p.35)

Venet’s primary studio is in New York; however his works are brought to realisation and produced at a foundry in Hungary. As is the nature of the material – steel is only malleable when heated to extremely high temperatures. The Arc series are produced by rolling the steel with machinery while the metal is hot, however the Indeterminate Lines require a more “hands-on” approach. Industrial clamps and tongs are used to hold the steel lengths while they are pulled and twisted into shape. “My work at the factory is a game of natural constraints between my intentions and the material itself. Each orients the other and is orientated in its turn. I propose directions but am at the same time directed by the steel bar which resists, and will not surrender to my will to dominate. In this game of concessions I must leave its autonomy at the helm.” (Bernar Venet, Bernar Venet, Artha Benteli, 2002, p.95)

Venet’s sculptures continue to tour Europe and North America, with recent exhibitions in Ceryg-Pontoise, France, Knookke-Heist, Belgium, downtown Chicago and at Gow Langsford Gallery, Auckland in early 2006. In 2004 Venet held three simultaneous solo exhibitions across New York City – at the Robert Miller Gallery, Jim Kempner Fine Art in Chelsea, and three large-scale Indeterminate Line pieces on the Park Avenue Malls.

In early 2005 Venet was awarded France’s highest decoration, Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur, for his enhancement to the reputation of France through arts.